I loved the Horizons phonics and reading program for grade 1, but am sad to say that I am disappointed in the second grade program. Reading comprehension is lacking, as well as writing and I have decided to switch programs. This reinforces the rules of phonics, but that is about it. The spectrum word and phonics program looks better, so I will give that a try. I feel I wasted my money here.

I really like the Horizons Program. Both my boys (grades 1 & 2) have done very well with the Horizons phonics, math, penmanship and spelling. Regarding the "weird" stories...we just found them interesting and different from what you read today. My son liked learning "new" vocabulary and looking up words in his spelling dictionary that he hadn't seen before. The 2nd grade readers that go with the Phonics program had two wonderful classic stories in them and my oldest looks forward to reading them every school day. I am ordering Kindergarten, 2nd and 3rd grade programs from Horizons for this coming year!

I was a little disappointed to see that some of the changes in the lessons didn't make it in to the teacher's manual and some weren't completely changed in the student's workbook, (i.e. a picture of a sheep that had the child writing "shed" underneath.) Other than that we love this series! My 6 year old does better at it than I do! She never fusses to do her phonics, which is a blessing!

This is the first time I have ever left a poor review of ANY product. I completely agree with "luvsjesus". And it doesn't stop there. When they commented about the stories being "weird" and "obnoxious" - that's EXACTLY what WE thought!! LOL! VERY STRANGE. Completely disappointed in this entire program. Bought a lot of it, too, and dropped it. We stopped using it. We wasted our money. I should have seen if I could have returned it, I guess. Too late now. I will never again buy ANY of the Horizons products simply because of the particular books I purchased. Don't even want to see what else they offer. Please don't waste your money and time. There are MUCH better programs available for your children!

I was reading the Reader 1 that is included with this set and "boom" right out of the blue was the donkey word that starts with an "A".

In this day and age, a child cannot call a donkey by it's original name in an elementary class. Can you picture them being in Sunday School and your child cries out in his/her innocence, "Oh that's Jesus riding an "a**" in front of the kids of today. That's a beepity-beep that just doesn't work because the meaning has changed in this millennium. I am disappointed that Horizons hasn't come to this understanding.

Also, some of the other stories at the very beginning were weird and obnoxious so I skipped them. I unfortunately feel I wasted my money here.

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